And they smelled it... the smell of borscht with garlic, a fried cutlet and a fresh salad. And everything would be fine, but a long-awaited customer is already walking down the corridor with a payment slip for a tidy sum. And then you realize that last night’s nightmare is nothing compared to this feeling when you want to fall through the ground.
How to maintain a working environment
If it turns out that you can’t escape lunch, try a few tips to maintain your work environment and your health:
- Don't let your lunch have a strong smell. The office should smell like money, not delicious borscht.
- Try to make the food attractive appearance. You don’t allow yourself to go to the office in a comfortable dressing gown.
- If there is no refrigerator in the office, bring food chilled in special containers or a thermos. Even without a refrigerator, it will not go bad in a few hours.
- Choose dishes that still taste good cold if your workspace isn't equipped microwave. Hot food in a thermos will become tasteless and not very healthy in a few hours, so it is not recommended to bring lunch in this form.
- Your food products should be as balanced as possible.
Some ideas on what to cook for lunch
To get rid of the smell of borscht and add variety to office smells - surprise your colleagues with your dishes lunch at work!
- Batter-fried turkey fillet:- first you need to cut the meat into portions; For the batter, we need to beat a raw chicken egg, add one tablespoon of water, a little flour, so that the batter becomes similar in consistency to liquid dough, add salt and spices to taste. Fry each piece of meat, dipped in batter, on both sides in sunflower oil until the crust is browned.
- Fish in marinade: you will need to cook white fish fillet; so, marinade - grate raw carrots and fry on vegetable oil with onion rings, after adding tomato paste, you need to add a little bay leaf and peppercorns and, of course, salt, season it all with sugar and vinegar. Divide the fish into portions, pour marinade over it and put it in the refrigerator overnight.
- Chicken nuggets with crispy breading: The fillet needs to be cut and beaten a little; What does liason consist of (from the French liaison - connection, connection): beat the egg, after mixing breadcrumbs with salt and black pepper, add granulated garlic to taste. Each chicken piece should be dipped into the lezon and fried. dip in breading mixture until golden brown.
- Homemade boiled pork: Take a piece of pork weighing about 1 kg, stuff it with cloves of garlic, then slices of carrots, then you need to rub it with salt and spices. Wrap in foil or place in a thermal bag and bake in the oven for approximately 1.5 hours. Let cool and cut into small slices. Baked pork makes very tasty sandwiches, especially if you add horseradish to them.
- Italian salad: Boil the pasta (choose small ones), drain and rinse cold water. Ham and pickled cucumbers should be cut into cubes. Grate hard cheese, then season everything with mayonnaise and mix.
- Baked chicken legs: First, rub the chicken drumsticks with salt and season with more pepper and garlic. Afterwards, put everything in a thermal bag and bake in the oven.
- Vegetable rolls and salmon: You need to grease the thick lavash well with melted cheese, then put chopped dill and small slices of salmon on top, always lightly salted. On top add fresh cucumber, cut into strips, and a little lettuce pepper. Then we roll it into a roll and cut it into portions.
- Casserole or pasta: Preparing the dough: You need to beat 4 raw eggs, add 200 gr. kefir, 120 gr. mayonnaise, 200 gr. flour, 10 gr. baking powder, 1-2 tablespoons of salt, and mix. As a filling, we use your choice of either minced meat, fried with mushrooms and onions, or canned fish, or frozen vegetables. Pour 2/3 of the dough into the baking dish, lay out the filling and fill with the remaining dough. You need to bake until golden brown. As an addition or side dish, you can use boiled potatoes, or fresh vegetable salad, lecho. However, do not forget that a person needs to receive a hot meal at least once a day.
When you go on your lunch break, leave the windows open to ensure the room is well ventilated.
What to do on your lunch break
Be sure to spend some of this time eating. This is necessary so that you do not experience a feeling of hunger that prevents you from working fully. In addition, it is simply necessary to have lunch in order not to gain weight, because nutritionists have proven that for this you need to eat food 4-5 times during the day with breaks of 3-4 hours. If you do not have the opportunity to eat a full lunch in a cafeteria or cafe, you need to take what you have prepared at home with you so as not to snack on chips, buns and cakes that are harmful to your stomach and figure.It usually takes 15 to 30 minutes to eat lunch, so you should spend the rest of your time in a way that is beneficial for you. No wonder they say that best vacation, this is a change of activity. To maintain efficiency and a clear head throughout the workday, take a full rest during your break. If you are busy physical labor, try to relax, preferably in a lying or reclining position, so that the muscles of your arms and legs can rest. Ask your colleagues for a light massage or give it to yourself.
For those who work at a computer, you can include a five-minute sports session in your lunch break, during which you can do simple exercises and stretch your muscles.
If your job is sedentary, do not stay in the office during lunch break, continuing to sit at the computer, even if not working. Many people try to go shopping during their lunch break, but this, of course, can hardly be called a vacation, it will only make you more tired. Be sure to take a walk, sit on fresh air. Free time can be usefully spent communicating with a colleague or friends who work nearby, inviting them for a cup of coffee or taking them for a walk, you will get
It turns out that just one hour in the middle of the working day determines its entire continuation. Here are eight ways to spend this very important hour right.
1. Eat the right foods
Even if you want to lose weight or have an urgent errand, don't skip a meal or at least have a snack. The amount of glucose you consume directly affects your productivity. But it’s better, of course, to have a full lunch and order (or take with you) food that will support brain activity.
2. Rest to regain your focus.
Nowadays, lunch breaks in offices are becoming shorter and shorter, and many even have lunch at their desks. However, even just 15 to 20 minutes of rest is a great way to maintain focus and energy levels throughout the day.
All the little tasks we do every day while we work and the decisions we make drain our psychological resources. Taking a lunch break or even just a short time out supports our brain's ability to restore its resources.
If you never take breaks from your work or your important thoughts and activities, it reduces your ability to think creatively about a task.
Kimberly Elsbach, Professor of Management, University of California, Davis
So if you skip lunch, keep thinking over interesting project and learning something new, you only reduce your creativity.
3. Be mindful: nothing but food
Only lazy people don’t talk about meditation these days, but to meditate a little, you don’t have to lay out a yoga mat and sit in the lotus position. You can totally meditate during your lunch break.
Here's what Leo Widrich, co-founder of the Buffer blog, says about it:
We often watch TV, work, read or do something else while eating, without paying any attention to this process. It's funny, but now for many of us, simply eating seems like a waste of time. But latest study multitasking showed the opposite picture. Limit concentration during the meal process not only helps you digest food better, but also ensures greater productivity in all other tasks.
Leo Widrich
A study published in the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology found that 20-minute meditation breaks for call center workers significantly reduced stress in the afternoon. Compared to the second group of workers, who spent 20 minutes of rest talking with colleagues, the meditating operators were much more stress-resistant.
Relaxation techniques have a positive effect on blood pressure, sleep quality and other factors, including the ability to concentrate. So a little meditation while eating will be very helpful.
4. Take a nap to improve your memory
Sleep is short, so if you have the opportunity to take a short nap, you should do so. Man is designed in such a way that he simply needs a second short nap during the day.
Our body's natural clock regulates processes such as sleep. This clock is a group of cells called the suprachiasmatic nucleus and helps the body determine when it is time to engage in certain activities, including sleep.
What’s important is that at two o’clock in the afternoon you feel drowsy, and if your lunch break falls around this time, then it’s best to take a little nap.
After this (it is best to sleep for a maximum of 20 minutes, if more, then after waking up you will be haunted by drowsiness) enough space will be freed up in your memory for new information, since sleep helps to clear the space of any information that you receive during the day, so to speak, sort it into shelves.
Important events will move to long term memory, and minor ones will be erased, so you wake up with a fresh head.
5. Practice
Another activity assigned by our biological clock, is a workout. If you have a late lunch break, you can spend some of it on training, because from 15 to 16 hours a person has better physical performance and a lower risk of injury. In addition, from 2 to 6 p.m., muscle elasticity is increased and the lungs work better than at the beginning of the day.
Even a few hours after noon your indicators physical activity will be better than in the morning. For runners, cyclists and fans of other endurance sports, morning - worst time for classes. So if you want to exercise every day, it's best to do it at lunch, not before work.
Of course physical exercise many benefits including stress relief, improved mood, self-confidence and feelings self-esteem. And all this will be very useful to you in your work.
If you don't have time for a full workout, you can try. If you go home for lunch, this is quite possible.
6. Spend time in nature
Very soon the weather will be suitable to spend your lunch break outdoors. Studies have shown that a walk in a quiet park then helps to concentrate better, and after such a rest a person returns to work with the opportunity to take a fresh look at problems and tasks.
On the other hand, walking down the street takes up more attention, so a person cannot fully relax and the brain does not rest as intensely.
So, if you are lucky enough to work next to a forest, park or other island of nature, don’t miss your luck and go for a walk after eating. Or even take your food with you and have a snack in the park.
Another study found that people living in areas with good landscaping were less likely to experience depression and anxiety, experience less stress, and recover from this condition more quickly.
7. Go to a cafe, get inspired
If you can’t tear yourself away from work, take your laptop and go to a cafe for lunch. There are many reasons why this is a great option for your lunch break.
It has been proven that the general noise that is always present in such establishments has a positive effect on your creativity. Moderate noise levels, as opposed to quiet or very noisy environments, make all tasks performed a little more difficult, just enough to push us out of our comfort zone and push us to think creatively.
The next advantage of working in a cafe in the afternoon is a change of environment, which means a shift in the point of attention and new solutions. There is even an idea: divide your working day into blocks and perform each of them in a different place. This helps you get to work faster than if you were sitting at your usual workplace, saturated with boredom and reluctance to work.
8. Post something on social networks
What else can you use your lunch break for? To post something on social media.
Research on this topic has confirmed that better time for posting - lunch break. Office workers They are just distracted from their work and entertain themselves while eating by idle reading interesting resources.
For example, a KISSMetric study found that best time for tweeting - at lunch or 6 pm.
Sitting at work and seeing how the clock hands have passed 11 am, the thought appears in my head that lunch break is coming soon. However, most workers simply waste their allotted time for rest, which is simply necessary after mental or physical work.
Let's figure it out and find out how company employees usually spend their lunch break, and what else you can do to brighten up your free time.
Rest for 60 minutes is reserved not only for the necessary meal, but also for “cleansing” the head of various thoughts, so that the second half of the working day can be spent with fresh thoughts and head. Therefore, it must be formed correctly, a person must rest as much as possible within such a short period of time.
What do employees usually do in the office during their lunch break? They check their email, social networks, chat with their colleagues over a cup of coffee, or continue working on work that they could not finish before lunch.
Thus, these actions will turn into a kind of work during rest in a few months. After all, only a vacation that will distract you from office work can refresh your head.
We bring to your attention a list of things to do that will help brighten up your lunch break and take a break from the work routine.
1. Regardless of the weather, go outside, take a walk and get some fresh air.
2. You can go to the nearest store and brighten up your break with a little shopping.
3. Listen to your favorite music on your phone or work computer with headphones.
4. Upload to your computer photographs and pictures that resonate with you. joyful emotions. After such a slide show, you will not only relax and be collected, but also receive a great charge of positivity.
5. Visit a site with jokes or funny stories.
6. Do a little warm-up for your eyes, arms, legs, back.
7. Keep an album and draw in it whatever comes to mind.
8. Start dancing to energetic music; you can include your colleagues in the dance.
9. Walk around the office, you can go up to the top floor and admire the view from the window.
10. Do breathing exercises.
11. In hot weather, walk barefoot on warm grass or earth.
12. Call your husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, parents or friends. They will certainly appreciate your attention, and you will be in high spirits after such a call.
13. On the street, watch birds, squirrels, dogs, passing cars or strangers.
14. Read an excerpt from your favorite book.
15. While walking on the street or sitting on a bench, eat ice cream, drink coffee, juice or water with great pleasure.
16. Watch several short interesting videos.
17. Look at pictures or collect information about unfamiliar places to which you can devote a future vacation or the next weekend.
18. Treat yourself to a bar of chocolate or a small cake, of course, if you are not on a diet.
19. In summer weather, you can soak up the afternoon sun for a few minutes.
20. In winter, you can make some simple figures out of snow.
21. In autumn, you can collect a small bouquet from fallen leaves.
22. Take note of some figures from books on origami and try to please your employees with cute paper figures.
23. Take a nap for 15-20 minutes. Set an alarm in advance or ask a colleague to wake you up.
24. Light a candle and stare at the burning flame for a few minutes.
25. Use a camera to arrange a photo session for your colleagues or take a couple of pictures on the street.
26. Remember the old childhood pastime - blowing soap bubbles.
27. Stock up on a magazine with scanwords or other puzzles.
28. Learn an unfamiliar word in explanatory dictionary or foreign.
29. Using two or three small balls, try juggling them.
30. Close your eyes for two or three minutes and try to break away from everything you do and indulge in a short meditation session.
32. Come up with a way to please your loved one.
33. Find a new one on the Internet culinary recipe and try it for dinner.
34. Subscribe online to daily newsletters on things that interest you.
35. Start learning a foreign language.
This is only a small part of what you can do to entertain yourself during your free lunch time. You just have to show a little imagination and desire, and then the gray working days will acquire new bright colors.
While we always recommend leaving your desk during your lunch break, there are days when lunch at the office is the only option. Emails accumulate, the phone does not stop talking, and the calendar is filled with more and more new meetings - on such days, either eat right at the table, or don’t have lunch at all. During the day, your body needs the most energy to complete all its scheduled tasks. This is why it is very important not to skip meals. Using our advice, you will not harm your figure or health!
We plan and pack
If lunch at work is unavoidable, prepare for it in advance. Take time at the beginning of the week to plan what you will eat throughout the week. Make a shopping list, go to the store and try to pack your food for tomorrow the day before. Buy vegetables for the salad in advance, prepare 5 lunch bags containing nuts and dried fruits; You can also prepare the soup and bring it with you in a jar. With a little planning, everything will immediately become much easier!
Safety first
When bringing food into the office, you need to keep safety in mind. After shopping for food, go home immediately and put perishable food items in your refrigerator and freezer. Wash your hands before preparing food, cook at proper temperatures, and avoid cross-contamination. When you get to work, immediately put the food in the refrigerator. Remember, if you eat a perishable product, it needs to be heated to the correct temperature before consumption.
Cleanliness everywhere and everywhere
Before eating lunch at your work place, it's important to make sure it's clean. Hold wet wipes at hand so you can always quickly wipe the table. Be sure to wash your hands before eating. The office is full of germs and bacteria just waiting for an unwary victim. Did you know that there could be something on an office desk? more bacteria, than on the toilet? Ugh!
Easy to eat
It is important to bring something that can be eaten quickly and easily. Again, we don't recommend multitasking during lunch, but sometimes duty calls. You can have a peanut butter and banana sandwich; carrots and hummus; drinkable soup and whole grain crackers; apples and raw nuts; rice and beans or Greek yogurt and berries.
Balanced lunch
Even if eating while working may seem rushed and insufficient to you, don’t look at it that way! Like everything else, it should be well balanced and provide your body with fuel and nutrients, necessary for him to survive that day. A large carbohydrate-rich lunch may fill you up, but it won't be as healthy as a well-balanced lunch that will give you the energy to further work. Make sure it contains lean protein (Greek yogurt, beans, quinoa, tofu, chicken breast, turkey breast, etc.), some carbohydrates (whole grain bread, brown rice, sweet potatoes, etc.) and some healthy fat. (olive oil for salads, avocado pieces, nuts or nut butter, seeds, etc.).
When preparing lunch, don't forget to think about drinks. Instead of packing a can of soda in your bag, bring a bottle of water with you that you can refill from the office cooler. This will be great healthy decision! It's easy to drink up extra calories while sipping soda while browsing orders, avoid this! Remember, water is yours true friend and ally!
Stand up
No matter how busy you are, your health is much more important than any project you're working on. Take time to stretch your body during your lunch break. Go up and down the stairs, stretch your legs, go outside - in a word, move! Sitting at a desk all day can lead to a whole host of health problems (and it's not just back and neck pain).
Yes, sometimes we have to eat right in the office, without stopping from work, but try to make this happen as little as possible. Let yourself rest, have a full and healthy lunch, and then you can not only “recharge your batteries,” but also stay healthy and slim.
